Abstract
This chapter discusses the case study workers experienced a sharpened sense of critical awareness about the work. In the three studies, alienation is treated as an emergent construct, not taken for granted either on the basis of a history of literature about it or on the basis of an agreed stipulative definition. A deliberate initial decision was taken by the case study workers that the co-ordination meetings should be about methodology rather than substance. Until drafts of reports were available, case study workers were careful not to exchange substantive ideas (about alienation and transition) at the meetings. In this way, the case studies were relatively insulated from one another until the meeting where draft reports were exchanged. The chapter agrees by participants in these meetings that the 'phenomenon' of alienation from school was ubiquitous and likely to be rather similar across sites.